Of Truth and Beasts

Wynn lurched back, but Shade wouldn’t stop. The dog lunged again with a vicious snarl.

—Wynn ... back ... Wynn ... stay—

“Not now, Shade,” she said. “Stop trying to—”

A shriek upon the plain smothered the last of Wynn’s words. It hadn’t even died before she screamed out, “Chane!”

Chane shook and convulsed—though only one white petal had fallen upon his palm.

He had stood up, holding his precious find by the stems, only to pause and wonder. They were just flowers, as strangely shaped as they were. In curiosity, he could not help pinching one petal with the fingertips of his free hand. Indeed, it felt like silk-thin velvet, though it stuck to his fingertip. He quickly pushed it off with his thumbnail, and it dropped into his palm.

It was so fragile, like Wynn.

The petal in his palm quickly darkened—first to dull yellow, and then to ashen tan. As it withered, black lines spread from beneath it, twisting and threading through the skin of Chane’s palm. He whipped his hand to shed the tiny husk, but the lines did not stop. They wormed up through his wrist.

Chane dropped the flowers and grabbed his wrist. He thought he felt his skin begin to split beneath his grip, but instead, the veinlike marks were worming up his forearm, beneath his shirt’s sleeve.

He began to grow ... cold.

He never felt cold—not after rising from death—not even when his hands had frozen solid in the mountains. Paralyzing, icy pain filled his black-veined hand, quickly following those worming lines into his arm. The cold carried agony to his shoulder and into the side of his throat and face.

Chane shrieked, the sound deafening in his own ears.

He began to fall, darkness thickening before his eyes, as his widened senses collapsed. Someone—somewhere—called out his name.

Was it Wynn, or did he only wish it so?

Sau’ilahk slowed at a scream carrying across the plain.

Chane vanished into the grass, and before his scream faded, Wynn’s cry spread over it. She was here, looking for him. Most certainly the dog would be with her.

Everything changed in an instant for Sau’ilahk. He heard the dog’s snarls, and then someone thrashed farther off near the forest’s edge.

Sau’ilahk could not bring himself to flee into dormancy. Frustration was unbearable with the temptation of Wynn so close, and Chane had been alone with that ring so close within reach. Sau’ilahk hovered in the dark, caught in indecision, until ...

The thrashing in the grass kept coming closer. It was now well beyond where Chane had stood, and the sound of snarls and growls came with it.

—Wynn ... stay back!—

Shade’s command erupted in Wynn’s head as the dog charged into the grass toward the last place they’d seen Chane. Wynn wasn’t about to stand there, and she bolted after Shade. All she could do was follow the grass parting in the passing of Shade’s black form.

It was only moments until she realized they should’ve reached Chane. Shade didn’t stop there. She charged onward into the plain as Wynn slowed for an instant.

“Shade?” she called in a hushed voice. And then, louder, “Shade, get back here!”

Shade’s snarls grew more distant by the moment. All Wynn could do was hurry onward, until she nearly tripped over a fallen form writhing in the grass.

Even in the dark, she could see Chane curled up and convulsing. He gripped his right wrist, silently choking and gagging as if ... as if trying to breathe.

Wynn dropped to her knees beside him, not daring to risk igniting a cold lamp crystal. That would only alert anyone else out here. She grabbed his face, trying to turn it toward her, and his flesh felt damp and icy, as if he’d been out in a winter storm.

“Chane?” she whispered, but he wouldn’t focus on her. “Chane! What’s—”

A massive hand clamped over her whole jaw and mouth. It smothered her voice as something hulkish wrapped her in thick arms and jerked her back. Before Wynn began struggling, an iron staff toppled and flattened down the grass beside her.

“Quiet!”

Ore-Locks’s gravelly hiss was too loud next to Wynn’s ear.

“Riders ... across the plain,” he whispered. “Do you want them to find you ... or him, like this?”

Ore-Locks removed his hand. As he released Wynn, she spun away on her knees, but his attention was fixed into the distance along the forest’s tree line. She didn’t even wonder how he had found her.

“I don’t hear anything,” she said urgently. “Now help—”

“I can feel hoofbeats on the earth,” Ore-Locks answered, “long before a human can hear them.”

Wynn was too frantic to answer back. Shade had run off, and she didn’t know what was wrong with Chane. If Ore-Locks was right, they had to leave before the patrol stumbled on them.

“Get him out of here,” Ore-Locks ordered, hefting his dropped staff. “I will delay the riders long enough.”

“No! I can’t lift or drag him by myself. You have to help.”

Wynn finally heard the hoofbeats, more than one set. The Shé’ith were coming.

Ore-Locks hissed something under his breath as he reached down to grab hold of Chane’s shirtfront.